Mark Tidd, Editor

by Clarence Budington Kelland

“You bet,” says Rock. “Whatever you want from we.”

“All I want,” says he, “is to have this kept quiet till after the paper comes out d-day after to-morrow. That’ll be the end of the contest, too, and the dinners and everything. And we can print this whole thing, and almost knock the eyes out of folks with what’s been goin’ on right under their eyes, and them never knowin’ it!”

“I guess,” says Lawyer Jones, “that you’re entitled to that much.”

And so the mystery kept on being a mystery for a couple more days.

Mark got a lot of mail that day and spent most of the morning opening it and studying it. He didn’t let on what he was up to and we knew better than to ask. Then he went out, and him and Tecumseh Androcles Spat talked and talked and figured. After that Mark came in and wrote all the afternoon, and then most of the evening, and as fast as he wrote Tecumseh and the young man we’d got to help him set up in type what Mark had written. Part of what he was doing was writing the story about Rock and the mystery, but most of it wasn’t that at all. It was something quite different, as Mr. Spragg and the merchants that had gone into his daily-paper scheme found out.

And still the subscriptions came in. It was running close. The Home Culturers had four hunderd and thirty-four, and the Literary Circlers had four hunderd and twenty-nine. Of course nobody knew how many votes there were but just us fellows. That night the first dinner, the Literary Girders’ dinner, came off, and you’d better believe it was good eating. Eat! Whee! I almost busted the band of my pants, and Mark! you wouldn’t believe what that fat kid mowed away. I was sure I’d never be able to go to the dinner the next night and eat a bite. But I did. Of course we all took quite a lot of exercise during the day, and didn’t eat much, to save space.

The Home Culturers’ dinner looked to me like it was every bit as good as the Literary Girders’, but among other folks there was a lot of argument. I don’t know but there might have been a real squabble if Constable Ginney hadn’t been there with his star right outside of his coat, warning folks to keep the peace. He scared ’em.

The last day was a tough one for all the women in the contest. They worked like anything, both getting ready for the food show and hauling in the last subscriptions that were to be had. We were busy, too, and as the day moved along we began to get kind of worried. Goodness knows, when we saw how things was coming we had reason enough to worry.

Mark went out to get the last items of news before we went to press, and I went with him. We saw the afternoon train come in, and there got off it Mr. Spragg, who grinned at us like the cat that ate the canary, and a whopping big man that was tanned and dark as an Indian. He went to the hotel, and Mark told me to go in and write what items I had while he went to the hotel to see if there was anything there. He didn’t come back for quite a while, and I went out again. I passed the hotel and saw him talking to the big man, both of them as earnest as if they was planning to run off with the bank.

When Mark came back he looked all excited, and fidgeted around as if it was hard for him to hold himself in. It was easy to see something had happened.